The Legend of El Dorado

El Dorado is perhaps one of the most widely known of mystical places that has captured the imaginations of many people through the years. This legendary city has fascinated quite a lot of explorers who have spend their lives trying to find this so-called "City of Gold "

The first story about El Dorado was heard by the Spanish conquistadors from the Muiscas in Colombia. The story was about a ritual made by the king or chief priest of Muisca on a nearby Lake Guatavita.

Legend has it that the Zipa, or king, covers himself with gold dust in a religious festival and rides in a raft filled with gold ornaments into the center of the lake and throws them into the water as offering to the Guatavita goddess. This brought about the legends that there is a city of gold surrounding the area where the Muisca lived. It also fascinated the conquistadors of the possible wealth of gold that lies beneath the lake.

The story later formed into a fascinating legend where accounts of a mythical tribe that even had cooking utensils made of gold began to spread. It fueled the fervor and the excitement in many of the European explorers to start looking for this golden city and take ownership of the riches that awaits them. According to the stories, the Europeans began to piece together the clues and decided that the fabled city may be found hidden somewhere in the unexplored forests of the Amazon Valley.

Upon hearing of this legend, the Europeans has since been fascinated to look for this fables city in South America. It has enticed many explorers to look for it for centuries. One of the most famous of such expeditions concerns that undertaken by Francisco de Orellana and Gonzalo Pizarro who traveled down to the Rio Napo into the Amazon Valley all the way to its delta.

Another of the many notable expeditions for the fabled city of El Dorado was that of Sir Walter Raleigh who also failed to find the city of gold on two expeditions. A lot of other expeditions to find the mythical city and went into the unexplored areas of the Amazon forest, some of them never able to return.

Although the expeditions for fabled city of El Dorado have virtually ended, the legend still remains in the imaginations of people who ares till fascinated by a place where gold is seemingly abundant. The tale of El Dorado has since become synonymous to a place where one can easily get rich.